Many items are constructed with hinged members such as folding tables, doors, covers and lids. Many of these items are constructed to include some kind of safety feature, which will lock or prop the items in an open position so that they will not fold at an inopportune time and collapse.
A brace or prop safety feature is especially important in the case of horizontal doors, lids or covers. This is due to fact that these doors or covers can be weighty and are often used by persons for ingress and egress from an area or space. The safety features on these hinged items are important to prevent a weighty door or cover from closing on a person, thereby injuring them.
The brace or prop is mounted on the door or cover in such a way as to impede the motion of the door when the brace is engaged. But in situations when there is movement or vibration in the environment around the door or cover, a brace or prop can be shaken loose, thus allowing the door or cover to close and fall unexpectedly. This situation occurs frequently in the case of scuttle lids on board ships. Often the scuttle lid safety brace arrangement is susceptible to being shaken out of position by the movement of the ship or other vibrations. In addition, the safety brace may be accidentally bumped by personnel. Scuttle lids have been tied in place and pieces of wood have been placed between the scuttle lid hinges and the safety brace to prevent the lid from closing. Albeit inexpensive, these measures result in a substantial time delay in closing the lid when required and can pose a safety threat.
There are covers commercially available constructed with internal torsional springs or other means to prevent the safety braces from being shaken loose. But there currently exists an immense number of hinged cover, door or lid configurations, especially on board ships. It would be prohibitive to replace every one of these with newer, safer products, both from the standpoint of cost and time out of service.
Accordingly, there is a need for an economical and easy modification and retrofit of existing safety braces to prevent covers, doors or lids from being shaken loose, thereby preventing injuries from the hinged items closing on persons unexpectedly, especially on board ships.
Additional advantages and novel features of the invention will be set forth in part in the description which follows, and in part will become apparent to those skilled in the art upon examination of the following or may be learned by practice of the invention. The objects and advantages of the invention may be realized and attained by means of the instrumentalities and combinations particularly pointed out in the appended claims.